The ability to track assets—including human assets, such as employees or visitors—in real time throughout a building or in multi-room premises can be beneficial, particularly in certain fields. One such application is in the medical field, where the ability to track both nurses and patients in a hospital, in real-time, is desirable. The solution for this is often referred to as Real-Time Location Services (RTLS).
There are two types of technologies used to support RTLS: (1) passive RFID (e.g. UHF), which utilizes cheap tags, coarse tracking and expensive readers; and (2) active tags, which utilize RFID technologies or a combination of technologies such as WiFi and Infrared (IR) that are generally much more expensive, but also yield much more precise location determinations.
Employees or visitors to a secure facility such as a hospital are often given an access badge or other device containing access credentials, which allows them to enter or exit one or more areas of the secure facility. In facilities that utilize tracking or location services, people that need to be tracked are often given an additional tracking device beyond the traditional access badge.